third runway

BAA - another one bites the dust

Submitted by Richard on Mon, 10/08/2007 - 10:53
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Will the last one to leave BAA please turn out the lights? Just over five weeks after joining, BAA's troubleshooter - remit: "to put passengers’ interests first" - has left the company.

It's almost getting too easy to mock the struggling airport operator at the moment. They're already under investigation for being so broke that the Competition Commission is concerned that their finances will impact upon passengers and airlines.

Since June, Tony Douglas has stepping down as chief executive of Heathrow, Mike Clasper stepped down as chief executive along with Marcus Agius, the chairman, Margaret Ewing, finance director, and Tony Ward, who was in charge of security.

Minister hides Heathrow noise report

Submitted by Richard on Thu, 10/04/2007 - 09:03
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Jim Fitzpatrick's hidden report

Rising noise levels are causing massive discomfort to people living under Heathrow's flightpaths, according to a leaked report which Aviation Minister Jim Fitzpatrick has been sitting on.

The report, Attitudes to Noise from Aviation Sources in England (ANASE) was ordered six years ago but kept under wraps since the DfT saw a draft in July. In a damming blow for proponents of the third runway, it has challenged the current measure of noise-related discomfort (57decibels), arguing that "significant annoyance" occurs at 50db levels.

Help BAA test Terminal 5

Submitted by Richard on Mon, 09/24/2007 - 11:48
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BAA's been having a bad run of it lately, what with their Chairman getting sued for corruption, lying to their staff over Stansted expansion, and getting accused of conspiring with the Government over nitrous oxide levels.

So when we heard they needed 15,000 volunteers to test Terminal 5, we jumped at the chance to help out. But one hundred Plane Stupid volunteers isn't going to make that much of a difference. To help BAA hit their 15,000 target, we needed to think bigger. And then it hit us: there's probably a few thousand people from the Camp for Climate Action who would love to pay BAA back for the hospitality they showed us during the week.

Want to join us? Click here to register.

Camp for Climate Action - 1,727 stop and searches

Submitted by Richard on Fri, 09/21/2007 - 13:55
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Camp for Climate Action

Anyone visiting the Camp for Climate Action last month might be forgiven for calling the policing a little 'over the top'.

Called to account by the Green Party's Jenny Jones, Sir Ian Blair, head honcho of the Metropolitan Police, wrote a letter which manages to avoid answering any of the difficult questions about police brutality, unlawful detention, or just why 'Operation Hargood' cost £7 million.

He does, however, reveal that the total number of searches during the week was 1,727, of which 230 were conducted under anti-terrorism legislation. Quite what the unlucky 13% were up to that made them so specially terror-istic remains to be seen, as does whether those frisked by over-eager Bobbies felt it was "entirely reasonable" to use such legislation against peaceful protesters...